Come with Me Under Water

So I should be working on my English project, which I have been working on all day.  But my incessant failure makes me think maybe I should take a break.  So here I am.

I was amused by Facebook today, as usual.  I was taking a survey, and one of the questions was, "Do you listen to music every day?"  ...  After I had gotten over the shock of having read such a question - solely because it implies that there are people who don't listen to music every day, WTF? - oh, and that took me a while, BTW; my reply was, "...this is like asking me if I breathe every day.  No really.  It is."  Because it is.  Who doesn't listen to music every day?  Really?  It's blasphemy!

Speaking of blasphemy, I have been introduced to Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog and it is TEH BEST.  (...they're related in my head.  Trust me.)  I love it sooo much.  And of course I also love Commentary! The Musical.  I want the DVD.  And my dad might download the blog from iTunes, and my Mp3 player holds video, so I could totally carry around Dr. Horrible in my pocket! ^^ /this is exciting news

Because of his awesomness, I think I shall be Dr. Horrible for Halloween.  I'll just...put my hair up.  It'll work.  If I can find everything I need.  And Halloween!  Nina and I are going to (yes, we are going to, Nina) take a bus up to visit my cousins on Saturday morning (October 31), go trick-or-treating with my adorable cousins, and take a train back on Sunday morning.

It will be EPIC.  Nina, bring your video camera.

Um.  I ran out of steam here.  It's kinda late.  By which I mean it's not, but I'm kind of tired because I'm sick.  Anyway.  I'll cut it short (yes, yes, you can all rejoice).  Peace.  But - not - literally.

Fair weekend has come and gone, but it was fun while it lasted!  For the most part.  There was the parade and rehearsal without any other horns and missing Band Day.  And working the band booth this morning.  But other than that it was awesome!

It kind of started on Thursday, when we got to miss most of school to go to the Big E!  It was lots of fun.  I got a pretty new necklace; a (plastic) purple sand dollar on a short gold chain.  It was only one dollar. (: And I rode a camel with Sailor.  It was very unsteady, but cool.  And then we marched, which wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be, but we were dying in our black wool uniforms.  Our black.  Wool.  Uniforms.

Anyway.

On Friday I got a haircut and had a lesson (yay!), and then headed over to the fair with Nina at three!  We were about the first people there.  We wandered around a bit until we met up with Sailor, at which point we went over to the flag booth (because they had been obsessed with flags at the Big E, and the guy who had run the booth we stopped at had been soooooo nice and awesome).  Then Sailor had to work the junior booth for like three hours, which is ridiculous.  I WAS going to meet up with Xannon between 3:15 and 3:30, but somehow he and Autumn got lost.

...

They blamed MapQuest.  Sure, guys. xP


Anyway, we met up around five.  And then Nina ditched us. *glare at Nina* So we mostly walked in circles, although we did go on the Ferris wheel.  Oh and of course I dragged Xannon over to the coin booth and made him stand there while I went through all the coins and figured out which ones I wanted.  And then we ate at The Common Italian, where I had THREE-QUARTERS of a piece of pizza and he had practically an entire large calzone.  And drank entire cups of soda at once. o.O And we had a debate about whether or not I'm anorexic.  Which I'm not, thank you very much both Xannon and Nina.

At 9:30 we met back up with Autumn and another friend.  We walked back to Autumn's car; she was giving me a ride home.  It was very fun, and I will say that Xannon's concern for his jacket is overwhelming. -.-

Saturday morning I had to march in the parade, which involved waking up at seven and marching in thirty-something-degree weather.  Which the black wool uniform did not help with.  And then as soon as the parade was over I had to go to SYO rehearsal, where I played with a total of nine other winds, none of which were French horns.  I was reprimanded multiple times.  Since we played all the parts where the French horns had solis.  It was great.  ...yeah.

And then today I worked the band booth.  I was decked out in winter gear and still cold.  And I did absolutely nothing except talk to Xannon, who was kind enough to entertain me for an hour or so.  And then I saw my friend from freshman year (before she moved to Granby), who I had been looking for Friday night but hadn't found!  And I got to see her and it was awesome.  And so now I'm boring you all with my nonexistent blogging skills.  So I'll go now.

Bye!

So, I was prepping to tell you all about my day at my first rehearsal of SYO (which I still will, by the way; don't worry...or something), but then I read GMH (www.givesmehope.com, an awesome site that you should all check out) and was seized by a sudden urge to lash out against idiots like these boys' parents:

"When my friend's brother told his family he was gay, his parents wanted to disown him. My friend told his parents that they either had two sons or none. My friend's support of his brother GMH."

Really?  Really?  "Oh good Lord our son is gay; clearly, we must disown him for this atrocity"?  WHAT?  I quite honestly don't understand. 

Okay, in the spirit of the goodness of humanity (so that I'm not just ranting about the supreme unintelligence of the human race), the friend does GMH (give me hope, if you couldn't figure that out).  There are so many people on this site that I wish I knew, so that I could personally thank them over and over in every way I can.

So, on to SYO!

It started off with a picnic, which was not such a great idea because there were literally hundreds of yellow jackets swarming the food.  And I learned something new today: yellow jackets are particularly attracted to tuna.  Guess what I had chosen to eat (before I learned this, obviously)?  A TUNA SALAD SANDWICH!

...

I ate in the car.

So I found out that I knew a few people there, and I socialized a little bit, and then we had an "orientation," which was basically just us sitting there while the manager told us a bunch of stuff I already knew from reading the schedule and the handbook.

Then we went to rehearsals (finally)!  I'm second chair (first chair is a guy who's been in the orchestra for five years), so I'm happy about that.  And we're playing the entirety of Shostakovitch's Symphony No. 5, which has the worst.  Range.  Ever.  But it's a really good piece, even if the beginning does start with ♪=76 and we have really complicated rhythms with thirty-second notes and Es five spaces below the staff in bass clef.  It'll be fun. :3 And the concert is at BHS!  (I think I may have already said this.)  I'm going to end up carpooling with the third horn.  His mom is also a horn player, with the PVS (sometimes) and they live like five minutes away from us.  Carpooling was inevitable.

So I started getting tired about fifty, sixty minutes into the rehearsal, seeing as we played for about ninety percent of the fourth movement (which we were working on) and I haven't played for extended periods of time since June.  But, I suspect my endurance will soon be building up once again.  I'm really excited for the rest of the season!

Also, school is just THREE DAYS AWAY! :D (And I can be one hundred percent happy about that now because I have minimal summer work left to do!) YAAAY!

I come bearing oodles of great news! :D

1.) I just got back from seeing Harry Potter for the fifth time, which can only be classified as "great news."  I saw it with my grandmother today; I have previously seen it with Nina, Luna, my family, and my aunt.  It was just as good as the first four times.

2.) I had my audition for SYO, and I got in! :D The first rehearsal (which includes a potluck picnic!) is on Sunday.  (Oh noes!  Not so soon!)  The first concert is conveniently at BHS, and I am very excited for the huge amounts of time this is going to take out of my schedule.  (Maybe not.  But I am excited to have made the orchestra!)

3.) Perhaps the best news of all: Not only have I written all of my essays for English, but three of them are within four lines of two pages!  Which means I only have three more to pare down! :D And the best part is, on my very last essay, I wrote a two-page essay (exactly two pages) the first time. o.o WHO KNEW IT COULD BE DONE?

So, there is my "oodles of great news."  After having seen Harry Potter today, I decided to past a new poll (and I'll see if I can actually make a poll this time!).

Poll #1449382 Tom Riddle as Portrayed By...
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 1

Who does the best job of portraying young Tom Riddle?

*crosses fingers* Hopefully it'll work.  Enjoy!

So, my English teacher is crazy.  I'd say it's because she doesn't know me yet, but she does, because I was in her study hall last year.  Although I guess she doesn't know me as a student.  Maybe that's it.

But she thinks that I can write an essay in two pages.  At least she expects me to.  All of my essays so far are at least three. ._. And she won't read it if it's over two pages. D: And also, I called her like two weeks ago and her husband picked up and said she wasn't there, so he'd have her call me back.

She hasn't called me back.

Why do I always seem hyper when I'm writing my journal entries?  Maybe it's because I type so fast, I feel like the pace of my journal has to be fast.  Who knows.

Also recently, I've been looking at the different courses that colleges have to offer (okay, really only the anthropology and psychology and linguistics ones--but those are the ones that are important!), and Lawrence (of course) has the most awesomest courses ever.  Some, but not all, of them are: Sociolinguistics, Language and Culture, Personality Psychology, Second Language Acquisition, Introduction to Morphology, Social Psychology, Developmental Psychology, and History of Anthropological Ideas.

Some people spend their summers swimming and partying and going to exotic places to vacation.

I stay at home and research what kinds of anthropology, psychology, and linguistics courses various colleges have.

Middlebury also had some intriguing anthropology courses (one in particular: Death and the Body), but like many colleges (and this is incomprehensible to me), it had no linguistics programs.  And as Middlebury is supposedly one of the best schools in the country for world languages, I am deeply disappointed.  I was also deeply disappointed that some of their most interesting classes (as they appear to me) aren't being offered for the 2009-10 school year!  i.e., Personality Psychology, Sociology of Culture, Social and Personality Development, The Anthropology of Human Rights, Human Motivation, etc.  There were others that were important that weren't being continued, but not that I'd take.  And there were others that are still offered that I found quite interesting too.  But I won't bore you any longer. xP Au revoir!

So I'm thinking about summer work and French horn playing right now.  I have Springfield Youth Orchestra auditions on the twenty-fifth, and I have to have "Romance" and my Mozart concerto ready.  Along with all my scales, which I'm actually more concerned about.  But they're in desperate need of horn players, so I'm pretty sure I'll get in, especially since I'm a pretty good French horn player.

And on the subject of summer work, East of Eden is so saaad!  The end of the fourth chapter (which is as far as I've read) made me just go, "NOOOOO! D: "  But it's really well-written and overall a good book so far as I can tell.  That aside, I am making the worst progress. ): I probably shouldn't be posting this.  I should be reading. >>

And on the topic of school, I can't wait until senior year when I can drop math.  (I actually really bring this up because I was having a conversation that brought up music theory and it reminded me.)  I'm going to drop math and take advanced music theory instead.

This is a very exciting prospect.

I am also probably going to take anatomy.  This is because anatomy is more closely associated with the career path(s) I'm thinking about following, and also because the alternative (physics) involves math.  Ew.

OH.  MY.  GOOD LORD.  Luna just called me and gave me the most best amazing news EVER IN THE ENTIRE WORLD.  Her mother became a member of the Boston Science Museum, which means she gets tickets to go to the Exhibition in Boston on October 24--one day before the Exhibition is open to the public.  She got an extra ticket.

Guess who they're bringing with them.

ME.

My brain isn't processing this correctly, I think.  I think it's stuck in a loop and can't get past "Oh my God I am going to the Harry Potter Exhibition before it's even officially open."

Oh my God, I am going to the Harry Potter Exhibition before it's even officially open.

Excuse me, I have to go scream into a pillow, or else my parents will get mad at me.  The excitement is ridculously indescribabale.

Okay, I just want to point out that I posted this earlier today along with a poll (and consequently a bit more text), but my computer was so unbelievably frustrating that I gave up on trying to edit it.  Seriously, I was sick and crying with frustration.

Anyway, here's most of the original entry:

I was thinking because I haven't posted since--*checks*--June 14, I should probably update or something.  I saw Harry Potter for the third time today.  I'm really disappointed with my slow progress on this; it's been, what, twenty-two days since it came out and I've only seen it three times?  I have one friend who'd seen it four times in, like, the week it came out!  (I did beat her by going to the midnight showing, but still.)  It is such a good movie.  I can-not believe that my sister didn't really like it and thought it was "rather boring."

Speaking of movies, I also want to see 2012 (which Luna and I think should be released in 2012) and District 9.  And I believe Nina wants to see Sherlock Holmes, which I will probably end up seeing with her.  But I still have to see Harry Potter at least twice more because I have to see it with Luna (there is a reason for that...*evil grin*) and with my aunt, who's visiting for my brother's birthday on the eleventh, which BY THE WAY is also Ginny's birthday and I am uber-jealous.

Also I have a new favorite show, by which I mean I have a new second-favorite show (but it's my favorite show right now because Criminal Minds is on hiatus.)  Well so is The Mentalist, but I haven't SEEN the shows.  I'm watching the re-runs for the first time.  I don't know if that made sense; and I just have to take this opportunity to point out, Nina, that I told you I would be no good at a) keeping up with this and b) writing anything worth reading when I did get around to writing.  I did tell you.

By the way, if you didn't pick up on it, The Mentalist is my new favorite/second-favorite show.

(This is where I inserted the poll.  It was about the movie, of course.  Actually...)

I'm going to re-insert the poll.  Except I'll just list the questions here and not list choices.  Here we go:
1. Who do you think best portrays their character?  (I think: Tom Felton as Draco Malfoy)
2. What is the best scene? (I think: Felix Felicis)
3. What is the most important scene left out of the movie? (I think: more backstory about Voldemort)
The last two questions weren't worth posting.  I obviously have a lot more, but I care about you and your sanity, so.  Comment with your answers!

P.S. I feel that in the near future, I will be posting an entry about the Harry Potter series; analyzing it, contemplating different situations, and so on.  Of course it will be very lengthy, take several days to write, and still not be done by the time I publish it, as I will undoubtedly look back at it and want to add something or change an opinion.

Just warning you.

Today, Nina, Luna, Sailor, and I all went to Noho!  Because apparently, those plans we were making in band on Friday were meant for today!

...

Anyway, first we went to Faces, the awesome-but-expensive-and-sometimes-disturbing store that I'd never been to before, much to the chagrin of my comrades.  I bought my sister a pencil case that looked like a taco which, unfortunately, she didn't like as much as I had anticipated.  I also saw this pair of awesome shoes that I wanted, but unfortunately they were shoes, and the were shoes at Faces, and they were too expensive.

Then we went to Sweeties, because any time you're in Noho there's no way you can skip over Faces and Sweeties.  I was amazingly excited to find out that they had chocolate frogs in stock!  I got one of those, and some rock candy and a few gummy worms.  After this, Nina suggested we go to Osaka (a Japanese restaurant) and share a Bento box.  So we walked over and, instead of a Bento box, we got--YAKI SOBA, my favorite Japanese food ever! :D (We also got some chicken negimaki stuff, but I didn't have any.)  Unfortunately all four of us shared both dishes so I got a teeny-tiny little bit of yaki soba.  But I'm making my parents take me back there soon, so it's all good.

Also, there was a guy on the other side of the room doing that little cooking show that they do in Japanese restaurants, but Nina and Sailor couldn't see so they came over and I shared a seat with Nina and Luna shared a seat with Sailor so we could all watch him.  I'm sure everyone else in the restaurant was thinking, "What on earth are they doing?"

Then Sailor's dad picked us up and dropped me off along with Luna at her house.  We jumped on her trampoline until my mom got there, reminiscing about our Shooting Stars soccer team reunion party last summer where we got the cops called on us.  (It was ridiculous, the music was really only loud enough so we could hear it.  And the cop was pretty confused when he turned the flashlight on a bunch of teenage girls, sitting in a circle on the trampoline in their pajamas, playing Truth or Dare.  We all actually thought it was pretty hilarious and were upset when we discovered that it wasn't in the police log in the paper.)

And now I'm sitting on the couch, writing this ridiculously long journal entry instead of studying for my history final like I should be, because it's tomorrow.  I think I'll change that now though. *rummages through a pile of papers until she finds her history notes, then looks up* Ciao!

That title was aimed at the fact that I'm going to have trouble keeping up with the journal, but as I typed I realized it will also apply to my entries and their content. >< Today was the end of our last full week at school! :D (Next Friday is only a half-day.)  Admittedly next week is chock-full of finals, but I think the fact that we don't have school for eleven weeks after they're over makes up for it.

Band today was great, because Mr. Meirazewski let everyone leave, which they did, except for the people organizing music and me, Nina, Luna, and...oh boy, here comes the name-making-up...you know what, I'll just call her Sailor.  And Nina and Luna and I all played our song!  It was awesome.  I love that song so much.  (We composed it; and by we, I mean Luna.)


And now I have a ninety-six-question ID sheet, an algebra review sheet, and an English essay to do; in addition, I also have to study for finals...no offense to LJ, but I'm going to stop wasting my time here now.  Have a good weekend, everybody!

So today I'm new to LiveJournal and Nina decided I should post something.  I have no idea what to write here.  She said I should write something like, "Hello!  I'm Aytrianette!"  So...

Hello!  I'm Aytrianette!  Right now I'm exploring the little icon tings at the top of the box here that let you add things like images and polls.  Umm.  Today I got a take-home history test?  Am I doing this right, Nina?  And Mr. Woodcock came into my study, except I was in bio making up a quiz I missed so he went down there to find me.  Except of course I had already finished so I went back up to study.  And then I was told that he had come in, so I went to his room and waited for like ten minutes before I left a note on his board and went back to study again.  Except when I got back to study he had come back and left my test with Mandi.  So I had to go back and erase the note I'd left on the board.

It was crazy.

Nina, I hope I did sufficiently well.  Thank you all for your time. *bows and exits stage left*

P.S. The preview of this entry says "tings" istead of "things," with an "h," and I would just like to assure you all that I can, indeed, spell and type.